But though Susannah uttered this with surety, she remained seated where she was upon the bed a long while, neither speaking nor moving, nor trying me again—and for my part, I listened to her silence, waiting for her to break it, as she perched there at the end of my bed in her nightdress, gazing over the harbor waters that stretched incessantly away outside our window. I think I did not love her more than then, Reader—and though I closed my eyes, I think I dreamed she sat upon my bed the whole night long, and then, at dawn, I woke. And Mother’s footsteps still beat up and downward in my head, like a slow rain coming on.

24 December

We sat quietly in the window seat of the dining room, our heads resting against the warm glass. All of the downstairs was swept and all the cushions had received their weekly beating, and now we dreamed a little in the winter sun. I did not want to look out the window; rather, I felt the slight heat on my shoulders and imagined us backward into summer, when I might lift my eyes from the work on my lap and see a tall man walking to me from down at the boathouse. Susannah hummed beside me, and without opening my eyes, I know she played with the cuirassed lace border that circled her waist; and the sound was almost like a wave slapping against a rock on a breezy day, the silk of her dress rustling as she shifted the lace forward, backward, forward, backward across her lap. I am a little glad this morning. George is to arrive back any moment.

(100 drops)

Christmas Day

On Mother’s tray, there was a little jagged smile bitten in her toast. “See there”—I pointed to Abby triumphantly—“her appetite has returned.”

George is delayed two weeks by hard snows down south, the board meeting postponed. I am so uneasy.

27 December

We have between the two of us, and without speaking of it, taken up most of the tasks about the house now—with Abby, of course. Susannah bakes, I am in charge of the fireplaces and the stove, and I empty the earth closet and keep the hopper full of earth—I have become a prodigious digger in the ground, carrying shovelfuls of the stored unfrozen ground in the root cellar up the stairs to feed the hungry hopper. I wonder, Would Ludlow recognize me?

28 December

Now I am frightened. Today Mother descended to us in her brown silk with the papillon collar and cuffs, though her hair hung down unbrushed and wild about her waist. Susannah asked if she would like it brushed. “Nay,” said Mother without stopping, then went directly to sit in her chair.

“Bring me the basket!” she motioned. I went to find the basket in the back pantry under the drying rack.

“There has not been so much since George and Mr. Thomas have gone,” I remarked on returning, and presented her with the mending.